Date:   October 14, 2008 (Tuesday)
Time:   3:30 pm EDT (refreshments at 3:20 pm)
Place:  Green Bank Auditorium
         (Video: CV-230/AOC-AUD)

Speaker:  Dan Reichart, UNC-Chapel Hill

Title:  The Skynet Robotic Telescope Network

Abstract:

Over it's first three years of operation, the Skynet Robotic Telescope
Network has taken approximately 1.2 million images for over 20,000 users,
including professionals, students of all ages (elementary through graduate),
and members of the general public.  To date, the network consists of eight
telescopes in Chile, North Carolina, California, and Colorado and an
additional nine telescopes are currently being added in Chile, North
Carolina, Arizona, Italy, and Virginia.  I will describe Skynet, including
our use of it to study gamma-ray bursts within seconds (which led to our
discovery of the most distant explosion in the universe in 2005).  I will
also describe a new public-private partnership that will open Skynet
telescopes to anyone anywhere by March 12, 2010 (the 400th anniversary of
Galileo's "Starry Messenger".)  Finally, I will live demo one of the
telescopes in Chile.

Colloquium Dinner:

Please RSVP by 4pm on Monday if you would like to attend the dinner in 
the cafeteria.  

Future Colloquia:

http://www.gb.nrao.edu/colloquia/colloquia.html